How many times have you heard this phrase?
“Wait, a (insert monster)? In (insert environment)? Don’t they normally occur in (insert different environment)?”
How many times has that been a headache?
This encounter addresses the dilemma. True, many random encounter generators, whether digital or printed, separate the reasonably possible creatures into the environs they should be expected in. However, you may wish to use a creature because you may never have tried a new one, or find the list of possible encounters uninspiring. The simple solution is to reskin a creature in such a way as to make it plausible. If real world species have variants that occur in strikingly different climates, then why not fantasy creatures? If foxes could have species variants ranging from the arctic to dry deserts, and we already know dragons have very specific subspecies for different environs, then applying that same logic to other monsters might be not only possible, but opens up an entirely new toolbox for you to use.
Building on both of those concepts, I intend to use the chimera as the basis, but we’re placing it in an environment it is not native to. Then, we’ll either swap or re-skin the heads so it is thematic with the terrain as well as believable.
Taking lessons from our own world, the chimera’s lion head becomes a Siberian tiger, and the ram becomes a mountain goat. The dragon’s head is the easiest to change. We simply change the red dragon head to a white dragon head, and therefore change the Fire Breath to Cold Breath, and the saving throw from Dexterity-based to Constitution. Now we have an arctic chimera.
Using the same logic, you can create a monster for different climates, including such extremes as aquatic or elemental depending on how much work you wish to put into monster creation or alteration.
All that remains now is to create a motivation for any monster. Chimera are typically proud, greedy and stubborn. They are also not that intellectually gifted, to say the least. This can be quite limiting in the context of usage. Experienced players may know of the chimera’s intellectual limitations, and coupled with action economy, turn a typical chimera encounter into a quick exchange of blows to resolve it.
The easiest way out for you to make this less predictable is to increase the monster’s Intelligence score. While this could be explained as an atypical mutation, such explanations have always earned at least one set of rolled eyes in my experience.
Magic then becomes the next easiest answer. This tactic is used in Argument where a magic item is applied to one of the two heads of an ettin to alter behavior. Whereas that created a possible roleplaying opportunity with the injection of some humor, in the case of the chimera we seek to make the monster less of a standard encounter and perhaps more of a villain.
Playing on the dragon head’s greed, it’s entirely plausible that a magic item like a headband of intellect might fall into the paws of a chimera and be taken by the greedy dragon head.
This would alter the monster’s outlook in a wholesale manner and would make one head far superior in its ability to direct the actions and schemes of a creature normally subject to infighting. This is in keeping with the trend of turning two-dimensional monsters into something more.
Encounter Type: Combat
Map: Isometric trail map
Lighting: N/A
System: 5E
Length: One shot
Installation Type: Addon
License: Roll20 End User License Agreement
(Personal Use Only, Do Not Distribute)